


Rain in the Desert

by sentimental_animals



Series: Melancholy AU [2]
Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Angst, M/M, Melancholy AU, Memory, Mild Sexual Content, Past Relationship(s), Pre-Canon, Smoking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-03
Updated: 2015-12-03
Packaged: 2018-05-04 16:38:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5341085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sentimental_animals/pseuds/sentimental_animals
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's raining in Night Vale, and Cecil never could stand the rain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rain in the Desert

**Author's Note:**

> A sad present for Chickadddddd, set before the start of the series.
> 
>  
> 
> [for added sadness, listen to ["Matches" by the Format](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozW8KMoVuDs) with this one]

Cecil never could stand the rain.

It was sad, he’d said; and they were lucky they were in a desert already or he would have dried them out accidentally. As it was, he’d created himself a peach farmer who grew invisible food, a feat of internal logic Earl would never understand. 

Earl shook his wet hair out by the door. He owned an umbrella somewhere, although there wasn’t much need for it; there was a particular kind of melancholy that brought rain, the wet and cold pattering of lost opportunities, potential flickering in the reflection of puddles. And anyway he’d spent most of the day undercover, watching Cecil fret and pace around his apartment, wrapped snug in a leather cloak in the bushes. Cecil had thoughtfully provided shelter for the officers assigned to his home. _Such a considerate guy,_ Earl thought, and laughed bitterly to himself. 

Earl’s own home was a mess. A bachelor’s life agreed with him as long as he lived in his truck, in the bushes outside of Cecil’s home, down in the secret meeting rooms. The second he had to come home, to eat meals by himself and sleep in an empty, unmade bed, it all fell apart. He’d grown up in this house. He’d probably die in this house.

Cecil’s last boyfriend had been like everyone before. Real or not real, they always left, somehow. Some of them needed to stay gone, some Earl had dispatched himself. Some were driven away by Cecil’s intensity, later by his fear of loss come to life. But they always, always ran from the weight of Cecil’s curse.

But Earl had not run. He’d given up everything to stay close, to protect him. The only one Cecil trusted, even if he didn’t know it. The constant, silent companion. His first and only steadfast lover. The old friend he’d drifted away from. The person he called when he needed a favor.

And now there was the whole mind-scanning mess, the only justification for a few decades of self-fulfilling prophecy. That was the best he could come up with? Sure, it wrapped up all his loose ends, but it played hell with the SSP schedules and made him even more guarded, harder to predict.

Earl was aching and tired. The rain pounded steadily, hypnotically, on the roof. He sat on the sofa and rolled a cigarette, searched his pockets for matches. Fuck. Nothing in his coat, either, or in that stupid cloak he had to wear.

He settled for leaning carefully beside the stove, and as he puffed he realized it was the first time he’d used the thing in months. 

They’d been here, once, together, a hundred years ago (it was also last year, he realized bitterly, when he was freshly eighteen), Cecil on his back on the kitchen table, eyes screwed shut like he was afraid to see Earl’s face, jaw clenched like he didn’t trust himself to speak. They’d sweated and panted and cried out together, and he held Cecil close afterwards, half afraid he would vanish in a puff of smoke.

Was the memory real? He was the only one there to account for it, after all. But he could still feel the nails on his scalp, the sharp pull of his hair, the desperate _fuck me_ hissed in his ear. He remembered the exact pattern of lovebites he’d left on Cecil’s throat and shoulder.

It had not been love, it was escape. Cecil needing to lose himself for a hour or so, to pretend everything was as simple as they wanted it to be, and that there was a way to go back and start again. 

It was a simpler time. Neither of them knew, then, that there _was_.

Earl looked away from the kitchen table, gazed absently out the window. It had rained that night, too, thunder drowning out the creaking of the table, the words of love Earl whispered into a kiss, words Cecil didn’t seem to notice at all.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the ghostly face at the window. Earl jumped in spite of himself, dropped his cigarette, winced when he caught it. He hissed in pain and looked back to the window. 

Apparently he’d startled Cecil, too.

The knock came seconds later; Cecil was on the porch, smiling a small and lost smile. “Oh,” he said, “hi, Earl.” Like he hadn’t just been skulking outside his window, wasn’t soaked to the skin at his door. Like they’d just run into each other at the Ralph’s. “Uh. How are you?”

“You look like shit,” Earl said, before he could stop himself. It was true, though; there were dark circles under his eyes, and he was clenching his hands at his sides. “Come on in.”

Cecil was distraught, and he was here. Presumably he needed something. Earl slipped into his mental blind spot until Cecil suddenly, dramatically remembered him, when he needed someone. It was better that way. Safer. That had been Earl’s idea, and he had no business holding it against Cecil. 

“Listen, I--” Cecil stopped. He turned, hands clenched, and visibly forced them to relax. “Can we talk for a bit?”

“Sure.” Earl smiled warmly, used his Scoutmaster Harlan voice, the one that had reassured scores of boys that they were safe and that everything would be okay if they just told the truth. “You want some coffee or--”

Cecil had his soaked shirt off in a second, and he let it drop to the floor with a wet slap. Cecil had aged in ways Earl hadn’t, but slowly, and his skin was smooth, unmarred by scars.

“Want something dry to put on?” He offered. He tried to keep his voice level, tried to pretend he didn’t know what the rain meant, that he didn’t understand this weather better than Cecil ever could.

“I think--Earl, I think it’s me,” he said quietly. “It has to be. The problem at the center of it all.”

_Shitshitshit_ \--It was too early for this--they should have years before he noticed anything. Nothing had even really gone wrong yet, no leaks in the boat they kept repairing and sending out decade after decade. 

“I’ve--I’ve got some whiskey. You want some whiskey?”

 

The burn was crescent-shaped, and it would probably blister. Earl held the cold tin mug snug in his right hand, let the condensation cool his stinging palm. 

He’d loaned Cecil some old clothes, a threadbare BSA t-shirt and pajama pants that were nearly falling off of him. His wet things had been hung over the curtain rod. Earl had only had a few moments to wish he’d kept the place a little tidier before Cecil snatched up the other mug, downed the two shots of rye Earl had poured in it, and set it back on the table.

“So,” Earl said, sitting on the other side of the kitchen table, “that bad, huh?”

He had to stay under control. Unless Cecil said something, unless he confirmed that he’d sussed it out, Earl’s role here was Old Friend, nothing more. Not Sheriff, and certainly not Past Lover.

He sipped his own drink more slowly and waited.

“You don’t do much dating, do you, Earl?” Cecil asked, reaching tentatively for the bottle. 

“Nah, I don’t have the time,” he said, and that was true. “Being a scout leader takes more time than you’d think.” He allowed himself a little inward sigh. Hopefully the romantic issue was all there was, for now.

Cecil swallowed, then nodded with a slight grimace. “Hey, remember when we were trying to make Boy Scout and I kept getting in trouble, because every time the scoutmaster said ‘weebalo’ I started laughing? Like, every single time, for three weeks?”

“Ha! Yeah, that’s right.” Outwardly, Earl chuckled and smiled, but inside he was screaming. Cecil inventing their history was very, _very_ dangerous, no matter what his reasoning was. He had to stop this, he had to--

_Why?_ said a little voice in his head. If anyone could steer Cecil away from the dark and bloody corners of his imagination, it would be Earl. _Let him have a few happy memories, let him daydream the life we should have had._

Cecil drained the little mug a second time and sighed. “We were so innocent.”

“So what happened? With that guy?”

Cecil waved a hand dismissively. “Fuck him,” he said, “I don’t even want to talk about it.”

“So why are you here?”

Cecil swallowed hard, picked at the formica tabletop. “Sometimes, I think--I can’t help but think--Earl, I bet we could have done something, you and I. Something--really nice.” 

Earl set down his mug and let his hand drop into his lap. His fist clenched tight, and one of his nails scratched into the crescent burned on his palm. 

“I mean it’s probably too late now--” Thunder tore through the sky, the flash of lightning illuminating the window behind Cecil’s head. The rain beat its irregular tattoo against the roof of the house Earl had grown up in, the house he figured he would never leave and never share.

He drained his mug, he made his decision. He had to be so steady, so careful all the time. Cecil got the luxury of ignorance and Carlsberg had played the whole thing like a game of chess, but Earl, Earl was the one who had to clean up them, after everyone, Earl was the responsible one. He’d earned a moment of recklessness, hadn’t he?

“Do you remember sneaking in here?” he said. “You learned to pop my window open from the outside, and you’d just crawl into bed with me, after your mom left.”

Cecil blinked, confused. _Figures he’d forget the thing that actually happened._

“Every few nights, for like, two years. I’d just roll over, and there you were. Always left the window open, too. One time my dad was out somewhere, and I came down here for a glass of water and you--”

Cecil nodded twice, the little nod that said _I wish I knew what you were talking about_ , and Earl gave up. He set his hands on the edge of the table--where Cecil’s hands had once gripped, one leg around Earl’s back, bracing himself with each thrust--and stood up.

“I got an early day tomorrow,” he said evenly. “You gonna get home alright?”

Cecil shrugged. “I walked here.”

“Want a ride home?”

“No, that’s fine. I like the rain,” he lied.


End file.
